Radclyffe Hall, 1918

The writer and poet Radclyffe Hall (1880–1943) is best known today for her semi-autobiographical novel The Well of Loneliness, which invoked public outrage following its publication in 1928 for its candid and sympathetic depiction of a lesbian relationship. Despite protestations from T.S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf and others, the publication was banned in Britain until 1949. In a letter of thanks to one supporter, Hall explained: ‘I wrote the book in order to help a very much misunderstood … section of society.’

Hall’s life, like her writing, was groundbreaking and controversial. Preferring to be known as ‘John’ rather than her given name, Marguerite, she wore masculine clothes and, at a time when male homosexual behaviour was illegal, lived openly with the singer Mabel Veronica Batten and later with the sculptor Una, Lady Troubridge. Hall cultivated the masculine appearance captured in this portrait by Charles Buchel (1872–1950) by pinning back her hair and wearing a grey silk cravat, monocle and well-cut jacket.

National Portrait Gallery, London. Bequeathed by Una Elena Vincenzo (née Taylor), Lady Troubridge, 1963
© National Portrait Gallery, London